[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
ENVIRONMENTALISM OFF THE RAILS:
HOW CARB WILL CRIPPLE
THE NATIONAL RAIL NETWORK
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS
AND OVERSIGHT
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE,
AND TECHNOLOGY
OF THE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JUNE 13, 2024
__________
Serial No. 118-44
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
56-042PDF WASHINGTON : 2026
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY
HON. FRANK LUCAS, Oklahoma, Chairman
BILL POSEY, Florida ZOE LOFGREN, California, Ranking
RANDY WEBER, Texas Member
BRIAN BABIN, Texas SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon
JIM BAIRD, Indiana HALEY STEVENS, Michigan
DANIEL WEBSTER, Florida JAMAAL BOWMAN, New York
MIKE GARCIA, California DEBORAH ROSS, North Carolina
STEPHANIE BICE, Oklahoma ERIC SORENSEN, Illinois
JAY OBERNOLTE, California ANDREA SALINAS, Oregon
CHUCK FLEISCHMANN, Tennessee VALERIE FOUSHEE, North Carolina
DARRELL ISSA, California KEVIN MULLIN, California
RICK CRAWFORD, Arkansas JEFF JACKSON, North Carolina
CLAUDIA TENNEY, New York EMILIA SYKES, Ohio
SCOTT FRANKLIN, Florida MAXWELL FROST, Florida
DALE STRONG, Alabama YADIRA CARAVEO, Colorado
MAX MILLER, Ohio SUMMER LEE, Pennsylvania
RICH McCORMICK, Georgia JENNIFER McCLELLAN, Virginia
MIKE COLLINS, Georgia GABE AMO, Rhode Island
BRANDON WILLIAMS, New York SEAN CASTEN, Illinois,
TOM KEAN, New Jersey Vice Ranking Member
VINCE FONG, California PAUL TONKO, New York
------
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
HON. JAY OBERNOLTE, California, Chairman
BRIAN BABIN, Texas VALERIE FOUSHEE, North Carolina,
MAX MILLER, Ohio Ranking Member
RICH McCORMICK, Georgia KEVIN MULLIN, California
VINCE FONG, California JEFF JACKSON, North Carolina
C O N T E N T S
June 13, 2024
Page
Hearing Charter.................................................. 2
Opening Statements
Statement by Representative Jay Obernolte, Chairman, Subcommittee
on Investigations and Oversight, Committee on Science, Space,
and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives.................. 6
Written Statement............................................ 7
Statement by Representative Valerie Foushee, Ranking Member,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, Committee on
Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives.. 9
Written Statement............................................ 10
Statement by Representative Zoe Lofgren, Ranking Member,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of
Representatives................................................ 11
Written Statement............................................ 12
Witnesses:
Mr. Ian Jefferies, President and Chief Executive Officer,
Association of American Railroads
Oral Statement............................................... 13
Written Statement............................................ 16
Mr. Chuck Baker, President, American Short Line and Regional
Railroad Association
Oral Statement............................................... 30
Written Statement............................................ 32
Mr. Alan Abbs, Legislative Officer, Bay Area Air Quality
Management District
Oral Statement............................................... 47
Written Statement............................................ 49
Dr. Tyler Dick, Professor, Texas Railway Analysis & Innovation
Node (TRAIN), University of Texas Austin
Oral Statement............................................... 53
Written Statement............................................ 55
Discussion....................................................... 61
Appendix I: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Mr. Ian Jefferies, President and Chief Executive Officer,
Association of American Railroads.............................. 76
Mr. Chuck Baker, President, American Short Line and Regional
Railroad Association........................................... 81
Mr. Alan Abbs, Legislative Officer, Bay Area Air Quality
Management District............................................ 92
Dr. Tyler Dick, Professor, Texas Railway Analysis & Innovation
Node (TRAIN), University of Texas Austin....................... 108
Appendix II: Additional Material for the Record
Letters submitted by Representative Jay Obernolte, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, Committee on
Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives
Josh Gackle, President, American Soybean Association......... 120
Kristen Swearingen, Vice President, Legislative & Political
Affairs, Associated Builders and Contractors............... 122
Advanced Biofuels Association, et al......................... 123
Dr. Alex Scott, Associate Professor of Supply Chain
Management, University of Tennessee, Knoxville............. 126
National Association of Manufacturers, et al................. 138
Stephanie Smith, President & CEO, Alabama Policy Institute,
et al...................................................... 141
Ryan Bowley, Vice President, Government Affairs, The
Fertilizer Institute....................................... 144
Wabtec Corporation........................................... 146
ENVIRONMENTALISM OFF THE RAILS:
HOW CARB WILL CRIPPLE
THE NATIONAL RAIL NETWORK
----------
THURSDAY, JUNE 13, 2024
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology,
Washington, D.C.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:01 p.m., in
room 2318, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Jay Obernolte
[Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Obernolte. The Subcommittee on Investigations and
Oversight for the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
will come to order.
Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare a
recess of the hearing at any time.
I'd like to welcome everyone to today's hearing entitled
``Environmentalism Off the Rails: How CARB Could Cripple the
National Rail Network.'' I'd like to begin by recognizing
myself for 5 minutes for an opening statement.
I want to thank every one for being here and to our Ranking
Member for being here for what's, for me, a very important
hearing. The purpose of our hearing today is to discuss a
proposal by the California Air Resources Board that could
cripple the national freight network. The Air Resources Board,
which we call affectionately CARB for short, is seeking a
waiver from the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) that
would require all locomotives manufactured after 2035 that
travel through the State of California to operate in a zero-
emissions configuration.
Now, the idea of zero-emissions locomotives sounds very
supportable. It certainly does to me. Unfortunately, though,
the technology to actually accomplish this does not currently
exist. In fact, there are actually many who doubt it could ever
be achieved. Even if this technology became feasible, we are
decades away from making zero-emission locomotives a reality in
the freight rail industry.
Currently, the vast majority of freight rail moves by
diesel electric trains, which convert mechanical energy from
diesel engines into electrical power that moves the wheels and
propels the train down the track. Because diesel is 27 times
more energy-dense than a lithium battery, a typical diesel
electric train can convert 5,000 gallons of diesel into 100
megawatt hours of energy.
Meanwhile, the largest, most powerful train battery
technology commercially available today holds only between 5
and 8 megawatt hours of energy. That means that CARB is
expecting the rail industry to invent a battery that can hold
up to 20 times more energy capacity than currently exists and
then mass produce that technology and include it on every train
in the Nation within the next 6 years.
Now, to be clear, I am certainly not saying that industry
shouldn't strive to make our freight network cleaner. And I
consider myself an environmentalist, and I think most of us on
the dais would make that same statement. But to impose an
arbitrary deadline that is not supported by science shows that
CARB has abandoned its mission to protect Californians from
harmful air pollution, to instead support unrealistic,
idealistic policies. Worst of all, to me, CARB's zealous
actions are threatening to derail years of progress made by
railroads to reduce emissions.
Through decades of investments and billions of dollars in
research, the rail industry can now move 2,000 pounds of
freight 450 miles on a single gallon of diesel fuel. The rail
industry continues to make investments to reduce emissions and
other particle contaminants through technologies such as
positive train control and trip optimization. As a result,
trains today account for less than one-half percent of U.S.
greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Even considering only the
transportation sector and only transportation-related
emissions, rail accounts for less than 2 percent.
Unfortunately, imposing this harsh and unrealistic
regulation will likely have an effect counter to the goal of
this regulation and of CARB's mission. If the EPA allows CARB
to implement this proposal and the rail industry is unable to
meet the impossible demands, we will likely see a shift in
modal transportation where all freight is no longer moved by
rail but is instead transported via trucks within the State of
California.
Unfortunately, heavy-duty trucks, which currently account
for 23 percent of emissions, would then become the primary
means of freight transport in California. Transporting freight
by truck emits roughly three times as much greenhouse gases as
transporting it by rail. This shift would undeniably result in
a massive increase in greenhouse gas emissions, which is the
exact opposite of what CARB claims this regulation is meant to
accomplish.
CARB also wants to ban the use of any locomotive that's 23
years of age or older. Buying a locomotive is not like buying a
car. The average class 1 freight locomotive has a service life
of 40 to 50 years. Locomotives are multimillion-dollar
investments that only make sense if used for extended periods
of time, similar to an aircraft or a large container ship. For
many short line railroads in my State, buying new locomotives
is simply not an option, and forcing them to do so means they
will have to simply cease operations. California knows this and
even admits it. In the proposed regulation CARB states that
some smaller class 3 locomotive operators will face significant
compliance costs and projects that it will likely--likely--lead
to their elimination if they are unable to offset them.
And unfortunately, the negative downstream effects of this
regulation won't be confined to my State of California. The
supply chain implications for this proposal could be far
larger. We all remember the supply chain nightmares that our
country experienced several years ago when there were 70
container ships were anchored off the coast of California
waiting for space to open in the ports of Los Angeles and Long
Beach. This event caused a supply chain disruption that was
felt nationwide. But if this waiver is granted, the new CARB
rule could create another similar situation with millions of
tons of goods waiting to be moved from ships onto trucks
instead of trains because CARB decided to ignore science and
plain common sense. Except, unlike the previous disruption,
this one would be permanent.
The House Science, Space, and Technology Committee is
meeting today to talk about science and technology. We're here
to analyze where the science and technology of rail is
currently at and what steps can be taken to reduce emissions
and other particle pollutants in a smart and responsible way.
So I want to thank you all for your willingness to be here to
discuss this critically important topic.
[The prepared statement of Chairman Obernolte follows:]
Good afternoon. Thank you all and to Ranking Member Foushee
for being here.The purpose of this hearing is to discuss a
proposal by the California Air Resources Board that could
cripple the national freight network.
The California Air Resources Board, or CARB for short, is
seeking a waiver from the EPA to require all locomotives
manufactured after 2035 that travel through the state to
operate in a zero emissions configuration.
The idea of zero emissions locomotives sounds very
supportable. Unfortunately, the technology to actually
accomplish this does not currently exist. In fact, there are
many who doubt it can ever be achieved. However, even if this
technology became feasible, we are decades away from making
zero emission locomotives a reality in the freight rail
industry.
Currently, the vast majority of freight rail moves by
diesel electric trains, which convert mechanical energy from
diesel engines into electric power that moves the wheels and
propels the train down the track. Because diesel is 27 times
more energy dense than a lithium battery, a typical diesel
electric train can convert 5,000 gallons of diesel into 100
megawatt hours of energy. Meanwhile, the largest, most powerful
train battery technology commercially available today holds
only between 5 and 8 megawatt hours of energy.
This means CARB is expecting the rail industry to invent a
battery that can hold up to 20 times more energy capacity than
currently exists, and then mass produce that technology and
include it on every train in the nation within the next 6
years.
To be clear, I'm certainly not saying that industry
shouldn't strive to make our freight network cleaner. But to
impose an arbitrary deadline that is not supported by science
shows that CARB has abandoned its mission to protect
Californians from harmful air pollution to instead support
unrealistic, idealistic, policies.
Worst of all, CARB's zealous actions are threatening to
derail years of progress made by railroads to reduce emissions.
Through decades of investments, and billions of dollars in
research, the rail industry can now move 2,000 pounds of
freight 450 miles on a single gallon of diesel. The rail
industry continues to make investments to reduce emissions and
other particle contaminants through technologies such as
positive train control and trip optimization. As a result,
trains account for less than 0.5% of U.S. greenhouse gas
emissions. Even considering only transportation related
emissions, rail accounts for less than 2%.
Unfortunately, imposing this harsh and unrealistic
regulation will likely have an effect counter to the goal of
this regulation and CARB's mission. If the EPA allows CARB to
implement this proposal, and the rail industry is unable to
meet the impossible demands, we will likely see a shift in
modal transportation where all freight is no longer moved by
rail but is instead transported via trucks within the state.
Heavy-duty trucks, which account for 23% of emissions, would
then become the primary means of freight transport in
California. Transporting freight by truck emits roughly three
times as much greenhouse gasses as transporting it by rail.
This shift would undeniably result in a massive increase in
greenhouse gas emissions, which is the exact opposite goal of
what CARB claims this regulation is meant to accomplish.
CARB also wants to ban the use of any locomotive over 23
years old. Buying a locomotive is not like buying a car. The
average Class 1 freight locomotive has a service life of 40 to
50 years. Locomotives are multi-million-dollar investments that
only make sense if used for extended periods of time, similar
to an aircraft or a large container ship.
For many short line railroads in my state, buying new
locomotives is simply not an option. Forcing them to do so
means that they will have to simply cease operations.
California knows this and even admits it. In the proposed
regulation, CARB states that some smaller Class III locomotive
operators will face significant compliance costs, and projects
that it will likely lead to their elimination if they are
unable to offset them.
Unfortunately, the negative downstream effects of this
regulation won't be confined to the state of California. The
supply chain implications for this proposal could be much
larger.
We all remember the supply chain nightmares our country
experienced several years ago. Over 70 container ships were
anchored off the coast of California waiting for space to open
in the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. This caused a
supply chain disruption that was felt nationwide.
If the waiver is granted, the new CARB rule could create
another similar situation, with millions of tons of goods
waiting to be moved from ships onto trucks instead of trains
because CARB decided to ignore science and plain common sense.
Except, unlike the previous disruption, this one would be
permanent.
The House Science, Space, and Technology Committee is
meeting today to talk about science and technology. We are here
to analyze where the science and technology of rail is
currently at and what steps can be taken to reduce emissions
and other particle pollutants in a smart and responsible
way.Thank you for your willingness to be here to discuss this
critically important topic.
Chairman Obernolte. I'd now like to recognize Ranking
Member Foushee for her opening statement.
Mrs. Foushee. Thank you, Chairman Obernolte, and thank you
to our witnesses for appearing before the Subcommittee today.
Since joining the Science Committee, it has been my
privilege to participate in hearings that have showcased the
very best of the Committee's mandate to lead the way in
advancing the breakthroughs and innovations of the future. This
Committee works best when we set aside narrow and parochial
thinking in favor of a broad and forward-looking perspective
that allows us to dig deep into solutions to pressing
scientific challenges.
With that in mind, I feel compelled to note that the
subject of today's hearing has virtually no connection to the
Science Committee's jurisdiction. We're here to discuss an
environmental regulation at the State level that is directed at
freight rail operations, none of which falls under the
Committee's purview. It is my hope that after today's hearing
concludes, we will refocus on the challenges and opportunities
facing the Federal research enterprise. Still, I will always
accept the opportunity to discuss the path forward for a low-
carbon future and the health risks faced by environmental
justice communities.
Diesel-powered freight rail operations are a significant
source of air pollution, a notable contributor to climate
change, and a major environmental hazard for frontline
communities located around major railyards. The State of
California, as a part of its obligation to provide clean air to
its residents, aims to reduce these harms with the end-use
locomotive regulation.
The rule requires the freight rail sector to adopt cleaner
locomotive technologies in the coming decades, and it seeks to
advance a transition to zero-emission rail operations that
would emit that would mirror America's broader shift to a clean
energy future. Fortunately, the State's action rests on a solid
foundation in terms of public health, cost-benefit analysis,
and technical feasibility.
The end-use locomotive regulation would have sweeping
public health benefits. According to CARB's modeling and
analysis, the rule would reduce statewide locomotive emissions
by approximately 7,400 tons of particulate matter and 386,000
tons of nitrogen oxide between 2023 and 2050. It would reduce
greenhouse gas emissions from locomotives by 21.6 million
metric tons. It would reduce hospital admissions and emergency
room visits and lead to 3,200 fewer premature deaths. It would
even reduce the cancer risk for communities located around
major railyards by over 90 percent by 2045. These statistics
translate to real cancer rate droppings, real lives saved, and
air that will be cleaner and healthier for millions of
Americans.
And despite the predictable complaints from industry, there
is every reason to believe that decarbonizing the rail sector
is realistic and achievable. We don't have to take CARB's word
for it. An independent peer-reviewed 2021 study led by
researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory made a
similar finding, concluding that, in the near future, battery
electric trains can achieve parity with diesel electric trains
nationally in terms of costs. Based on their analysis, these
independent researchers further concluded that re-
retrofitting--I'm sorry, retrofitting diesel electric
locomotives with battery electric technology could save the
U.S. freight rail sector billions of dollars, while yielding
environmental, health, and grid resilience benefits. Thus, the
argument that zero-emission alternatives will not be available
and that their adoption would be prohibitively expensive does
not appear to reflect the best available science.
I hope today's discussion keeps in mind that real lives are
at stake in the transition to cleaner freight rail operations.
Frontline communities should not be forced to sacrifice their
health and their lives because others are reluctant to invest
in the technological solutions made available by a clean energy
future.
And, Mr. Chair, I would yield back.
[The prepared statement of Mrs. Foushee follows:]
Thank you Chairman Obernolte, and thank you to our
witnesses for appearing before the Subcommittee today.
Since joining the Science Committee, it has been my
privilege to participate in hearings that have showcased the
very best of the Committee's mandate to lead the way in
advancing the breakthroughs and innovations of the future. This
Committee works best when we set aside narrow and parochial
thinking in favor of a broad and forward-looking perspective
that allows us to dig deep into solutions to pressing
scientific challenges.
With that in mind, I feel compelled to note that the
subject of today's hearing has virtually no connection to the
Science Committee's jurisdiction.We are here to discuss an
environmental regulation at the state level that is directed at
freight rail operations--none of which falls under the
Committee's purview. It is my hope that after today's hearing
concludes, we will refocus on the challenges and opportunities
facing the Federal research enterprise. Still, I will always
accept the opportunity to discuss the path forward for a low-
carbon future and the health risks faced by environmental
justice communities.
Diesel-powered freight rail operations are a significant
source of air pollution, a notable contributor to climate
change, and a major environmental hazard for frontline
communities located around major railyards. The State of
California, as a part of its obligation to provide clean air to
its residents, aims to reduce these harms with the In-Use
Locomotive Regulation. The rule requires the freight rail
sector to adopt cleaner locomotive technologies in the coming
decades, and it seeks to advance a transition to zero-emission
rail operations that would mirror America's broader shift to a
clean energy future. Fortunately, the state's action rests on a
solid foundation in terms of public health, cost-benefit
analysis, and technical feasibility.
The In-Use Locomotive Regulation would have sweeping public
health benefits. According to CARB's modeling and analysis, the
rule would reduce statewide locomotive emissions by
approximately 7,400 tons of particulate matter and 386,000 tons
of nitrogen oxide between 2023 and 2050. It would reduce
greenhouse gas emissions from locomotives by 21.6 million
metric tons. It would reduce hospital admissions and emergency
room visits, and lead to 3,200 fewer premature deaths. It would
even reduce the cancer risk for communities located around
major railyards by over 90% by 2045.
These statistics translate to real cancer rates dropping,
real lives saved, and air that will be cleaner and healthier
for millions of Americans. And despite the predictable
complaints from industry, there is every reason to believe that
decarbonizing the rail sector is realistic and achievable.
We don't have to take CARB's word for it: an independent,
peer-reviewed 2021 study led by researchers at Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory made a similar finding, concluding
that in the near future, ``battery-electric trains can achieve
parity with diesel electric trains'' nationally in terms of
cost. Based upon their analysis, these independent researchers
further concluded that ``retrofitting diesel-electric
locomotives with battery-electric technology could save the US
freight rail sector billions of dollars while yielding
environmental, health, and grid-resilience benefits.'' Thus,
the argument that zero-emission alternatives will not be
available, and that their adoption would be prohibitively
expensive, does not appear to reflect the best available
science.
I hope today's discussion keeps in mind that real lives are
at stake in the transition to cleaner freight rail operations.
Frontline communities should not be forced to sacrifice their
health--and their lives--because others are reluctant to invest
in the technological solutions made available by a clean energy
future. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman Obernolte. Thank you very much, Ranking Member
Foushee.
I'll now recognize the Ranking Member of the Full
Committee, Ranking Member Lofgren, for 5 minutes for her
opening statement.
Ms. Lofgren. Well, thank you Chairman Obernolte, for this
opportunity to discuss how our shared home State of California
is working to protect the health of our constituents. While
this is not a typical Science Committee hearing, I'm glad it
offers me a chance to welcome Alan Abbs from the Bay Area
Quality Air Management District. He and his colleagues work
hard to address harmful air pollution, including eradicating
the use of leaded aviation fuel in my district and beyond.
California has unique challenges that worsen our air
quality. We have major ports, increasingly intense wildfires,
and stunning California geography, which leads to an
accumulation of pollution in mountain valleys. These obstacles
are why the Clean Air Act allows California to seek waivers to
go above and beyond Federal standards to improve the State's
air quality.
In November, EPA issued a policy change that explicitly
allows California to seek an EPA waiver to issue locomotive-
specific regulations. As EPA explained in its notice, this
policy change aligns with the legislative intent of the Clean
Air Act. I was glad to see this because if California can't
regulate locomotives, it leaves a huge gap in the protection to
frontline communities.
According to CARB's analysis, the regulation we're here to
discuss today will reduce cancer risk around railyards by an
estimated 90 percent. It will result in 1,500 fewer emergency
room visits and 3,200 fewer premature deaths. Beyond those
health benefits, this policy makes sense in cost-benefit terms.
CARB estimates that the monetized health benefits outweigh the
equipment and labor costs by over $18 billion. That's a
reflection of just how much the public would benefit from the
shift to zero-emission rail alternatives and freight
operations.
Now, any regulation that changes the status quo is going to
demand some upfront costs, and it's not surprising to see
resistance from the railroad industry. Fortunately, there's
good news for them on the affordability issue coming from just
outside my backyard. As the Ranking Member has mentioned,
researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab led a recent
analysis that concluded the switch from diesel to battery
electric locomotives could save U.S. freight rail sector not
just a lot of money, $94 billion over 20 years in sector-wide
net present value. And this technology is not pie-in-the-sky.
Commercial availability is projected within the next 10 years.
CARB took that timeline into consideration when choosing to
phase in the requirements with milestone options available
through 2047. I'd also note that California is moving the
trucking industry also into zero emissions.
Now, the science behind the public health benefits is
clear. This regulation will save lives, and I hope EPA follows
the science in its consideration of granting the waiver.
This is also a topic with a lot of exciting technology. To
highlight, the regulation is going to spur adoption of state-
of-the-art zero-emission locomotives as well as tier 4
technologies that have been available for a decade. All of
these modern alternatives are a drastic improvement over diesel
engines, some of which have been chugging through our
community, emitting harmful exhaust for half a century.
So I thank the Chairman for this hearing. I thank the
witnesses for their participation. I look forward to their
testimony, and I yield back.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Lofgren follows:]
Good afternoon, and thank you to Chairman Obernolte for
this opportunity to discuss how our shared home state of
California is working to protect the health of our
constituents. While this is not a typical Science Committee
hearing, I'm glad it offers a chance for me to welcome Alan
Abbs, from the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (AQMD).
Mr. Abbs and his colleagues work hard to address the harmful
air pollution, including eradicating the use of leaded aviation
fuel, in my district and beyond. California has unique
challenges that worsen our air quality--we have major ports,
increasingly intense wildfires, and stunning California
geography which leads to an accumulation of pollution in
mountain valleys. These obstacles are why the Clean Air Act
allows California to seek waivers to go above and beyond
federal standards to improve the state's air quality.
In November, EPA issued a policy change that explicitly
allows California to seek an EPA waiver to issue locomotive-
specific regulations. As EPA explained in its notice, this
policy change aligns with the legislative intent of the Clean
Air Act. I was glad to see this, because if California can't
regulate locomotives, it leaves a huge gap in the protection of
frontline communities. According to CARB's analysis, the
regulation we're here to discuss today will reduce cancer risk
around railyards by an estimated 90 percent.
It will result in 1,500 fewer emergency room visits and
3,200 fewer premature deaths.
Beyond those health benefits, this policy makes sense in
cost-benefit terms: CARB estimates that the monetized health
benefits outweigh the equipment and labor costs by over $18
billion. That's a reflection of just how much the public would
benefit from the shift to zero-emission rail alternatives in
freight rail operations.
Any regulation that requires a change to the status quo is
going to demand some up-front costs, so it's not surprising to
see resistance from the railroad industry. Fortunately, there's
good news for them on the affordability issue, coming from just
outside my backyard. Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National
Laboratory led a recent analysis that concluded the switch from
diesel to battery-electric locomotives could save the U.S.
freight rail sector $94 billion over 20 years in sector-wide
net present value. And this technology isn't pie-in-the-sky--
commercial availability is projected within the next ten years.
CARB took that timeline into consideration when choosing to
phase in the requirements, with milestone options available
through 2047.
I want to be clear--I think the Science Committee is an
awkward venue for this particular discussion. I don't think my
role as Ranking Member is particularly relevant to my support
for state-level California regulatory actions. But regardless,
some Science Committee tenets certainly hold true. The science
behind the public health benefits is clear. This regulation
will save lives, and I hope EPA follows the science in its
consideration of granting the waiver. This is also a topic with
a lot of exciting technology to highlight--this regulation will
spur the adoption of state-of-the-art zero-emission locomotives
as well as Tier 4 technologies that have been available for a
decade. All of these modern alternatives are a drastic
improvement over diesel engines, some of which have been
chugging through our community, emitting harmful exhaust, for
half a century.
Thank you to our witnesses for joining us today. I yield
back.
Chairman Obernolte. Thank you very much, Ranking Member
Lofgren.
So, obviously, we have a difference of opinion on this
topic, and that's why we have our expert witnesses here to help
us navigate that. And we're going do that in a respectful and
inclusive way.
I did, however, want to briefly address the issue of
jurisdiction before we get into the testimony since our
witnesses aren't equipped to answer that question, and it's
something that I take very seriously. I'd like to remind my
colleagues that this Committee has jurisdiction over
environmental research, development, and commercial application
of energy technology. We also have jurisdiction over the
scientific issues related to environmental policy. And we're
here today discussing whether it's feasible to deploy
alternative energy technologies nationwide, so that is
absolutely within the jurisdiction of this Subcommittee.
And I'd also like to highlight that many of the
technological advances we're going to be discussing today came
about as a result of the Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and
Safety Improvement grants that are directly within the
jurisdiction of this Committee, so, you know, very apropos to
what we're going to be discussing.
And then lastly, it was--has been raised that this might be
a State issue and so might not be appropriate to have a hearing
at the Federal level. I think that that is untrue for two
reasons. First of all, the fact that what we're discussing is a
request by CARB of the EPA to grant a waiver, which is a
Federal issue. But the second larger issue is that we are
talking about a topic--the topic of the regulation of Federal--
of railways and of emissions of locomotives that is already
federally preempted. And we're going to be discussing the
dangers of allowing 50 different State regulations to exist
concerning the emissions of diesel locomotives and the
impossibility of having a national freight network when every
time you crossed a Stateline, you had to change locomotives.
So I take those jurisdictional issues that were raised by
my colleagues very seriously. That is why I felt that this
hearing was very appropriate.
So I want to move into our witness testimony. Our first
witness is Mr. Ian Jefferies, who is President and Chief
Executive Officer of the Associated--Association of American
Railroads (AAR). Mr. Jefferies, you are recognized for 5
minutes.
TESTIMONY OF MR. IAN JEFFERIES,
PRESIDENT AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER,
ASSOCIATION OF AMERICAN RAILROADS
Mr. Jefferies. Good afternoon. Chairman Obernolte, Ranking
Member Foushee, and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for
the opportunity to be here today where I have the privilege of
representing the Nation's freight railroads. And through $21
billion in annual private investments and a 140,000-mile
interstate network, rail touches most of the economy and
facilitates our modern way of life.
Railroads provide the greenest form of land transportation,
moving 40 percent of long-haul freight, yet accounting for only
2 percent of transportation emissions and less than 1 percent
of total emissions. Further reducing our environmental
footprint is a core business goal, and, as such, I relish the
opportunity today to discuss CARB's end-use locomotive
regulation, which seeks to begin phasing out diesel locomotives
by 2030. Now, doing so requires the EPA to grant a waiver
request, which is now under review.
CARB's regulation is unrealistic, and frankly diverges from
this Administration's Department of Energy's (DOE's) recent
budget requests, which includes funds to support a 50 percent
reduction in GHG emissions in a locomotive engine by the year
2030.
I must state the obvious clearly. EPA must reject CARB's
request immediately and consider the following three points.
First, the measure clearly violates both the Clean Air Act and
interstate commerce laws set by Congress. The former prohibits
States from regulating new or remanufactured locomotives,
recognizing that railroading is a national process operating
across all States. Congress reserved this job solely for the
Federal Government.
Second, the CARB regulation is impractical, mandating non-
viable technologies on an unrealistic timeline while grossly
underestimating the cost of the regulation, not merely for
railroads, but businesses that rely on rail as well.
Last, the EPA waiver approval would create a de facto
national regulation that would slow interstate rail traffic and
worsen inflation. Nearly 70 percent of the national locomotive
fleet operates in California at some point. And some other
States would be allowed to copy the regulation if approved, and
we cannot have a patchwork of laws across the State governing
what is the essential interstate form of commerce.
With that said, allow me to briefly address the landscape
for further emissions reductions and the pitfalls of CARB's
rule. Consider first that railroads today can move a ton of
freight nearly 500 miles on a single gallon of diesel. And this
is about three to four times more efficient than over-the-
highway freight. Building on their strong records, rail
carriers are actively piloting and testing new technologies for
their locomotive configurations. However, as locomotive OEMs
(original equipment manufacturers) have made clear, they are
not close to widespread commercial availability. Current
battery hybrid locomotive technology, for example, generates a
fraction of the power needed to replace diesel. The picture
grows even muddier when considering the challenges of building
out the necessary charging network.
Manufacturers are also making progress in developing ZE
electric switcher locomotives used in ports and yards to sort
traffic. This technology is in its infancy, and orders for beta
models have been significantly delayed. Yet CARB expects these
to be the exclusive locomotives operating in yards in less than
6 years.
Even further CARB's rule would require railroads to deposit
millions annually into an escrow account beginning in 2026. For
the two class 1 railroads that operate in the State of
California, that equates to about $800 million per year per
railroad, and for smaller carriers, around $5 million per year.
Economics 101 says rail transportation costs will be affected.
Inflationary pressure would shift freight to the highways,
increasing emissions, increasing congestion, and furthering
damage to publicly owned infrastructure.
A review of the public record shows that the threats are
real and understood for many key U.S. sectors and workers. From
farmers to chemical shippers to retailers to organized labor,
the record overwhelmingly opposes this rule. And the U.S.
Surface Transportation Board, which has primary jurisdiction
over the National Rail Network, has even voiced concerns that
CARB rule circumvents existing Federal law.
We are encouraged to see the leadership of Chair Obernolte
and so many congressional colleagues and writing to the EPA on
a bipartisan basis to express concern. This input should be
instructive to the EPA.
Thank you, and I look forward to your--our discussion
today.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Jefferies follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Obernolte. Thank you, Mr. Jefferies.
Our second witness is Mr. Chuck Baker, President of the
American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association.
Mr. Baker, you're recognized for 5 minutes.
TESTIMONY OF MR. CHUCK BAKER,
PRESIDENT, AMERICAN SHORT LINE
AND REGIONAL RAILROAD ASSOCIATION
Mr. Baker. Thank you. Good afternoon. I am Chuck Baker,
President of the American Short Line and Regional Railroad
Association, representing the Nation's 600 small class 2 and 3
short line freight railroads.
Short lines are the first and last miles of the freight
rail network. We move industrial, agricultural, and energy
products from ports, factories, and farms to and from the
larger class 1 railroads, where they bring the goods to and
from national and global markets. Short lines used to be the
unprofitable branch lines of the larger railroads. Luckily,
following partial deregulation, rather than abandon those lines
and rip up the track, the class 1 sold those lines to local
entrepreneurs.
Those newly minted short lines didn't have much traffic at
the time and weren't in great shape, but the small-town local
folks who took over those lines were eager to make a go of it.
They ran as efficiently as possible, focused all their energy
on getting just one more new customer or one more carload, and
bent over backward to serve their customers, and it worked.
Today, short lines are critical in your communities and pivotal
in making sure that the goods that your constituents rely upon
can get to their homes and businesses safely and affordably.
We manage 1/3 of the freight rail network and touch 1/5 of
all carloads, but still only account for about 6 percent of the
industry's total revenue, and we do it all with a light
environmental touch. Rail in total produces only 1.8 percent of
the transportation system's greenhouse gas emissions, and about
0.6 percent of the Nation's total emissions, and short lines
are a minuscule fraction of that.
The subject of today's hearing, the recent rulemaking by
CARB, is a policy overreach of epic proportions that takes
direct aim at our critical industry. CARB does get one thing
right when it predicts the demise of our industry due to the
costs of its measure, acknowledging in its own rule text that
if these businesses--and I'm quoting. ``If these businesses are
unable to pass on the cost of the proposed regulation to
customers, it is possible that some of these businesses would
be eliminated.'' Well, on behalf of these businesses, and the
families and communities that rely on them, I am here to sound
the alarm. They cannot pass on these costs to others, and when
these businesses go bankrupt, the effect will ripple across our
supply chain.
Short lines move roughly 260,000 carloads of freight in
California alone each year, and each carload carries the
equivalent of three to four trucks' worth of goods. If short
lines are driven out of business due to CARB's infeasible rule,
that freight will move on to trucks, and businesses who have
lost shipping options will move out of California or just
vanish. It's a torturous trifecta of negative impacts for rail
shippers that rely on a seamless rail network, for the economy
as a competitive advantage for American businesses is degraded,
and for Americans' quality of life as millions of additional
trucks are forced onto the road, increasing congestion,
crashes, deaths, taxes for road maintenance, and ironically,
greenhouse gas emissions and particulate matter from shredded
truck tires.
In addition to the dire real-world economic and
environmental consequences, we object for two other critical
reasons. One, this rule is preempted by Federal law. No State
should be able to regulate the national rail network, which is
what this rule does. Two centuries of legal interpretations of
the Commerce Clause and Federal statute, including ICTA
(Interstate Commerce Commission Termination Act), the Clean Air
Act, and the Locomotive Inspection Act, all render CARB's rule
illegal.
And two, its arbitrary and capricious. The rule calls on
the rail industry to upend its financial underpinnings to adopt
technology that is in its infancy and not ready for primetime.
Zero-emission freight locomotives don't exist in a commercially
viable form, they aren't at scale, and they don't have the
power to do the job needed in harsh railroad operating
environments. And even if all of that were magically resolved,
they are not remotely affordable for short line railroads.
CARB and short lines do agree that we both want to
aggressively move to reduce our already low environmental
impact. Our members are engaged in demonstration projects that
move our industry closer to a zero-emission reality, including
upgrading to cleaner locomotives, trying out alternative fuels,
and experimenting with fuel injectors and adjunct additives to
lower emissions quickly and affordably.
In conclusion, Congress can provide leadership going
forward in four ways. One, call on the EPA to deny CARB's
request, preserving EPA as the regulator of locomotive
emissions.
Two, continue to fund the CRISI (Consolidated Rail
Infrastructure and Safety Improvements) program. Short lines
have embraced this tool to move more freight to rail and to
upgrade to cleaner locomotives.
Three, ensure freight rail remains a key strength of the
Nation, supporting reasonable regulations focused on proven
benefits and avoiding excessive subsidization of trucking.
And four, support the basic R&D (research and development)
activities at the DOE and DOT (Department of Transportation)
necessary to advance the economywide transition to battery,
electric, hydrogen, renewable diesel, and other cleaner power
over time in a realistic and affordable fashion.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Baker follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Obernolte. Thank you, Mr. Baker.
Our third witness is Mr. Alan Abbs, Legislative Officer of
the Bay Area Air Quality Management District.
Mr. Abbs, you're recognized for 5 minutes.
TESTIMONY OF MR. ALAN ABBS, LEGISLATIVE OFFICER,
BAY AREA AIR QUALITY MANAGEMENT DISTRICT
Mr. Abbs. Chair Obernolte, Ranking Member Foushee, and
Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for inviting me here
today to testify on regulations relating to the public health
impacts of locomotive air pollution.
My name is Alan Abbs. I'm the Legislative Officer for the
Bay Area Air Quality Management District, which was created by
the California legislature in 1955 as the first regional air
pollution control agency in the Nation. The agency is
independent from State Government and is overseen by a board of
24 locally elected officials throughout the Bay Area. Our role
includes regulation of stationary sources of air pollution in
the nine Bay Area counties from Santa Clara and San Mateo
County in the south to Napa and Sonoma in the north.
The Clean Air Act defines roles for different levels of
government to achieve cleaner air and improve public health
through a framework of cooperative federalism. In drafting the
Clean Air Act, Congress recognized California's leadership and
long history of regulating air pollution from mobile sources, a
role that predates the Federal statute. Because of this, the
Clean Air Act protects California's ongoing right to regulate
those emissions, and if California standards are at least as
protective of public health and welfare, Federal preemption can
be waived.
Locomotives are one of the largest sources of health-
harming pollutants in California, and the pollution caused by
locomotives makes it impossible for California to meet its
Clean Air Act obligations. For highly polluted air basins such
as the South Coast and San Joaquin, locomotives represent 31
percent of the reductions needed to meet Federal air quality
standards under the Clean Air Act.
California's class 1 railroads are the Nation's largest in
both miles traveled and operating revenues, yet they continue
to use and are increasing use of some of the oldest and most
polluting engines in California. EPA-compliant locomotives have
been available since 2015, but most locomotives operating in
California have old emissions control technology that produces
90 percent more pollution than the current EPA standard. And
according to CARB, in the past several years, the average
emissions of their locomotive fleets operating in California
have been getting worse, not better.
In the San Francisco Bay Area, the regional air pollution
inventory has shown that locomotives operations, including road
hauling, switching, and rail passenger transportation
contribute approximately 40 tons of toxic air contaminants and
2,200 tons of ozone-causing nitrogen oxides in 2023. In recent
years under California Assembly Bill 617, the district has been
working with stakeholders to reduce disparities in air
pollution exposures.
Technical assessments indicate that locomotives are a key
driver of cancer risk, with locomotive emissions being of
special concern in neighborhoods adjacent to local railyards.
For example, West Oakland is a shorefront community adjacent to
the Port of Oakland with related railyards and four active
marine terminals. Locomotives operating at these railyards
account for an incremental cancer risk of about 125 additional
cancer cases per million, exceeding EPA thresholds for
acceptable risk. In Richmond/San Pablo it's about 100
additional cancer risk.
Even in areas that currently attain Clean Air Act
standards, pollution from locomotives is a serious public
health concern. Ninety percent of California's railyards are
within 1 mile of vulnerable residential communities already
highly impacted by traffic pollution, which contains the same
contaminants as from locomotives. Until the railroads take
serious steps to reduce emissions, these communities will
continue to have disproportionately high levels of air
pollution and suffer the health consequences.
In 2023, CARB adopted a locomotive regulation and, as
noted, would result in $32 billion in health savings, prevent
3,200 premature deaths, and 1,500 emergency room visits and
hospitalizations. It would also decrease the cancer risk from
exposure by up to 90 percent in places. CARB's regulation does
not set emission standards on new locomotives. It doesn't
mandate the use of zero-emission technologies by 2030 or 2035.
Instead, it calls for a steady reduction of emissions over the
next 30 years, allowing for existing technologies to be used
while new and more advanced zero-emission technologies are
developed. Rail providers could make significant strides in
meeting these regulatory requirements by just upgrading
existing equipment to the 2015 standards. While the regulation
does not require the purchase of new emission locomotives, it's
worth noting that such locomotives are available for purchase
today.
Real quickly on incentives, since 2016, the Bay Area Air
Quality Management District has provided incentives to upgrade
10 switcher locomotives to current technology, as well as the
Caltrain Electrification Project. While these projects have
demonstrated the feasibility, it shows that incentives alone
cannot meet this hurdle that we have of getting cleaner
locomotives.
So, in conclusion, thank you again for the opportunity to
testify. I would just point out that zero-emission rail
transportation is nothing new. Electrified rail is more than
100 years old and is widely used around the world. Nearly every
locomotive operating today runs on fully electric motors which
could be powered other than using diesel generators, and diesel
locomotives emit a toxic air contaminant for which there is no
known safe level of exposure.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Abbs follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Obernolte. Thank you, Mr. Abbs.
Our fourth and final witness is Dr. Tyler Dick, Professor
at the University of Texas Austin and Lecturer and Principal
Research Engineer with the Texas Railway Analysis and
Innovation Node.
Dr. Dick, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
TESTIMONY OF DR. TYLER DICK, PROFESSOR,
TEXAS RAILWAY ANALYSIS & INNOVATION NODE (TRAIN),
UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AUSTIN
Dr. Dick. Chairman Obernolte, Ranking Member Foushee, and
Members of the Subcommittee, thank you very much for inviting
me to participate in this important discussion today. My name
is Tyler Dick, and I'm an Assistant Professor in the Department
of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering at the
University of Texas at Austin, where I lead the Texas Railway
Analysis and Innovation Node, or TRAIN Lab for short.
For the past 12 years, I conducted research on railway
operations and energy efficiency, including the benefits and
costs of alternative energy locomotives. The opinions expressed
are my own and do not necessarily represent those of the
University of Texas.
Railways play an essential role in the U.S. economy as they
uniquely combine the speed, energy, and efficiency to safely
move large quantities of freight at low cost. Although U.S.
freight railroads continue to improve fuel efficiency, they
consume over 3 billion gallons of diesel fuel each year.
Despite representing less than 2 percent of transportation-
related emissions, freight railroads, like all of us, must act
to reduce carbon emissions in an effort to stem climate change
and the health impacts on adjacent communities.
However, freight railroads must be allowed to decarbonize
at a pace that respects the current state of zero-emissions
locomotive technology and in a safe manner consistent with the
operational realities of an integrated North American rail
network. Unfortunately, the aggressive timeline and scope
mandated by the CARB end-use locomotive regulation cause
concern on both of these fronts. Although a number of
technologies offer the promise of future zero-emissions-free
transportation, none of them are currently commercialized for
North American heavy haul freight mainline operations. Each
zero-emissions technology has unique technical, safety, and
implementation challenges that must be addressed before
widespread deployment is possible.
Traditional electrification through overhead wire will make
the most efficient use of electricity but requires development
of new electric locomotive designs to meet the performance
requirements of North American freight operations.
Battery electric locomotives have seen limited mainline
testing, and thus, their long-term range performance under
various climate, topography, and operating conditions is
uncertain, along with the viability of high-powered charging to
support economical battery locomotive utilization.
Hydrogen fuel cell locomotives, which make the least
efficient use of electricity, are only beginning mainline
prototype development, and thus, our understanding of their
long-term performance, durability, and safety is in its
infancy.
While I am confident that the railroads, railway supply
industry, government agencies, academia, and national labs can
partner to overcome these challenges, it will require years of
further research, development, and full-scale testing of each
technology, followed by years of commercialization and
deployment.
There are numerous historical examples of railway
technologies that appeared to be good ideas on paper or in the
lab but failed when rushed to market without proper testing to
expose them to the long-term realities of North American heavy
haul freight mainline operations. With its aggressive
timelines, the CARB regulation exposes emerging zero-emissions
technologies to suffering the same fate.
All three zero-emissions options will require expensive
investments in energy supply infrastructure, whether that be
overhead catenary wire, high-power battery chargers, or
hydrogen production and fueling stations. Should a
technological pathway prove not to be viable, early investments
in associated energy supply infrastructure will become stranded
assets. While dual-mode locomotives can help mitigate this risk
and reduce infrastructure requirements, they remain an unproven
concept in the freight environment and require time for
development and testing.
Finally, from an operational and implementation
perspective, the CARB regulation leaves freight railroads with
two undesirable alternatives. The first is to isolate new
locomotives to operations within California by having all
freight trains stop and swap locomotives at exchange points
just outside the State. In 2016, I led a CARB-sponsored study
that documented the negative impacts of these exchange points
on railway operations, including a potential shift of freight
from rail to less-efficient trucks.
The second alternative is a network-level implementation of
a given technology, which is impractical under the mandated
timeline and represents a tremendous investment risk given the
current state of zero-emissions locomotive technology. The
combination of dual-mode locomotives and partial or
discontinuous electrification on certain routes, in conjunction
with batteries or hydrogen on other corridors could provide a
third implementation pathway, but further research and testing
is required to prove the viability of these more flexible
concepts, and they're better fit to railway operating patterns
across main lines of different traffic density. Unfortunately,
the CARB regulation does not afford railroads the time or
flexibility required to achieve this more likely multi-
technology scenario in a given timeline.
Thank you for the opportunity to participate today. I'd be
pleased to answer any questions.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Dick follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Obernolte. Well, thank you very much to all of our
witnesses. That includes our witness--concludes our witness
testimony. We'll move now to the question-and-answers portion
of our hearing, and I will begin by recognizing myself for 5
minutes for questions.
Mr. Jefferies, let me start with a project that is
critically important to my district, and it's one I think
you're aware. BNSF has proposed to build a multimodal transfer
facility in the city of Barstow, which is in my district. It's
going to bring over 20,000 jobs to my community. And the
purpose of the facility is to transfer freight from the ports
of Long Beach to Los Angeles. Instead of putting them on
trucks, which is what happens now, they want to put them on
railcars, put them by rail out to Barstow, and then switch them
to other trains going other places in the country. So that
would shift the transportation of millions of tons of freight
from truck to rail.
Now, BNSF has said very publicly that should the--this
proposed end-use locomotive rule become enforced, that they
would no longer be able to build this facility in Barstow. And
they're in the middle of building it now. They would stop and
build it somewhere else because they can't afford to have
freight locomotives that can't go into California and have to
switch at the State border. It would make the whole system
completely nonsensical for them, and I understand that.
But help me understand this. It seems to me from a layman's
perspective that for CARB to take an action that forces the
transport of millions of tons of freight by truck that emits
three times as much greenhouse gases per pound of freight moved
instead of rail would be completely nonsensical and the
opposite of the goal that they're trying to achieve. Am I
missing something there?
Mr. Jefferies. You're not missing anything, and it's
completely counterintuitive to CARB's overarching goals. And
these are the types of projects that we should all be
celebrating and championing. This is a $1.5 billion project. It
would be the largest intermodal yard in the country, all done
with private dollars, not public dollars, and to your point,
taking thousands of trucks off a very congested corridor,
putting it on rail, getting it out of the L.A. basin into an
area to sort for long haul across the country. It's exactly the
sort of thing we should want to see happening, and it would be
such a missed opportunity if this project were put at risk
because of this rule.
Chairman Obernolte. And to amplify the point, that corridor
that you're referring to that is currently heavily trucked,
that's also in my district, and so I have a vested interest in
making sure that we shift those emissions to something that's
three times more efficient.
All right, Mr. Abbs, I had a question for you. I was
interested in your testimony about the fact that freight
locomotives in California were one of the largest emitters of
health-threatening pollutants. And that was your oral
testimony. In your written testimony, you had a fact that you
quoted that said locomotives represent 31 percent of the
pollution reductions needed to meet Federal air quality
requirements under the Clean Air Act And that 31 percent really
caught my eye because the statistics that the EPA gave us is
that railroads make up less than 2 percent of transportation
emissions and only about .05 percent of overall greenhouse gas
emissions. So can you tell me where that 31 percent statistic
came from? Because I'm having trouble reconciling it.
Mr. Abbs. Yes, Chair, thank you for that question. So that
number comes from the--from CARB's State SIP (State
Implementation Plans) that they turned in for the 2022 SIP
standard. So it represents the difference in emissions that
California would need to achieve to meet 2037 Federal Clean Air
Act requirements for particulate and NOx.
Chairman Obernolte. All right. Well, I'm going to have to
chase down why those numbers are so different because that
seems to counter to the data that the EPA is giving us.
And, Tyler, let me conclude here. I've got another--a
minute left here. One of the arguments for completely electric
zero-emissions locomotives is that even if it's not possible to
pack enough energy into batteries on a locomotive form factor,
it is possible to just have tenders that are pulled behind the
locomotive with more and more batteries. And even if you need
10 of those tenders to do the job of one diesel locomotive,
that that's feasible. But, you know, that's the argument. Do
you see some merit in that? Is that true? Or is that something
that you are skeptical about?
Dr. Dick. Well, that's something that my research group has
been actively looking at. While technically feasible to couple
up as many tenders as needed to provide the battery power,
there is the operational consideration of train length. So in
the United States, roughly 70 percent of the primary principal
mainline corridors are single track lines, and it can only have
one train operating at a time. And these trains pass each other
at very short sections of a double track called passing
sidings, and the length of those passing sidings can limit the
length of a freight train. So anytime you take away that
available length of a freight train and consume it with battery
tenders or tenders of any sort, you're going to be reducing the
potential number of rail cars that can be transporting revenue-
earning freight on those trains. And by doing that, you're not
only earning less revenue per freight train, but you're also
transporting less freight and making them overall less
efficient. So there's an efficiency penalty dictated by the
maximum train length that tenders impose on the network and
operations.
Chairman Obernolte. All right, thank you.
I'll now recognize Ranking Member Foushee for 5 minutes for
her questions.
Mrs. Foushee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
We must not forget that this issue at its core is about
human health and human life. Mr. Abbs, you testified that in
the community of Richmond/San Pablo rail activities increase
the risk of cancer by 20 percent. Meanwhile, CARB estimates
that the rule would decrease cancer risk in communities around
major railyards by over 90 percent by 2045. Environmental
justice communities bear the true costs of polluted air, so
they must be centered in any discussion about costs and
benefits for policies such as this.
So my first question is can frontline communities near
railyards in the Bay Area hope to achieve healthy air quality
standards without significant reductions in freight rail
emissions?
Mr. Abbs. Thank you for your question, Ranking Member. So
the simple answer is no. We've done significant work in
frontline communities, especially over the last 10 years,
communities such as West Oakland, Richmond, San Pablo, that
are--that have, as I mentioned, locomotive operations, port
traffic, a lot of industrial facilities. It takes effort in a
lot of those areas to get reductions to even get those
frontline communities down to the risks of the rest of the Bay
Area that doesn't have those industries nearby, but locomotive
operations and getting those cancer risks down through
increased locomotive regulations is absolutely critical to get
even close to what we would like to see in the frontline
communities.
Mrs. Foushee. And it's very common for industry to claim
that ambitious new air quality standards are impossible to
meet, and new technologies are immature and infeasible, but
time and time again, new standards are enforced. Our
environmental--our environment becomes cleaner, and the sky
does not fall. How does the industry's resistance to rail
decarbonization mirror other sectors' reluctance to adopt
previous air quality standards? And should past experience make
us optimistic about industry's ability to adapt to this rule?
Mr. Abbs. That's a good question. So our primary role as a
stationary source regulator means that the Bay Area AQMD
routinely tightens or strengthens regulations on sources of
industrial pollution, and we do find--as you say, every time
we'd like to strengthen regulations to lower emissions, the
first argument is that it's not achievable, it's not cost-
effective, we're going to leave the Bay Area, we're going to
leave California.
But time and time again, what we've seen in California in
general, we've managed to increase the State's GDP (gross
domestic product), become the fifth-largest economic powerhouse
if we were a country, and we've done that by making California
cleaner. And so I think we can do both, and this regulation
would definitely get us in that right direction.
Mrs. Foushee. Thank you for that.
Mr. Dick, thank you also for your testimony today. As this
is a Science Committee hearing, we always appreciate the
presence of technical experts. And we have a firm commitment to
scientific transparency. Your publication history shows that
you've authored or co-authored at least 37 papers since
publishing your dissertation. How many of these papers were
funded in whole or in part by the Association of American
Railroads?
Dr. Dick. Yes, thank you. I'd estimate that, depending on
the particular topic, most of my papers typically focus on
railway operations, so approximately half of those publications
would have had some high-level partial support when I was at
the University of Illinois from the Association of American
Railroads through gifts to the academic program there. They're
given at a very high level.
Mrs. Foushee. By my count, roughly half of your academic
research papers, as you noted, have been funded by industry,
and the primary source of that industry funding has been AAR.
In fact you even thank AAR for your support in your
dissertation itself. I want to be clear. Industry-funded
research is not inherently problematic, and I respect your
expertise. However, I think it's important for the hearing
record to reflect that your research funding has been highly
dependent on support from an organization represented here by
one of your co-panelists.
The testimony you presented today is closely aligned with
AAR's position. That's not a given. There is a wealth of
scientific research pointing to the technological feasibility
and cost-effectiveness of railroad companies switching to
cleaner technologies. So I think it's important to note that
while 3/4 of the panelists today are coming from--are coming to
an identical conclusion, that does not reflect the balance of
the full scope of scientific literature on the issue.
Mr. Chair, I yield back.
Chairman Obernolte. The gentlelady yields back.
I request unanimous consent to include numerous stakeholder
letters that the Committee has received on this issue into the
record. Without objection, so ordered.
We'll go next to my colleague from California. Congressman
Fong, you're recognized for 5 minutes for your questions.
Mr. Fong. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
If I could first go to Mr. Jefferies. As the Chair noted,
rail is a critical component of our supply chain. As you noted
in your testimony, California is home to two of the biggest and
busiest ports in America. The Port of L.A. and the Port of Long
Beach account for 40 percent of the goods and products entering
into the United States. And these ports are critical for
several sectors of the economy, as--whether it's on the import
side, but of course on the export side as well for especially
the farmers in my district.
And my question is if the EPA grants this waiver, could you
describe in more detail the impact to the supply chain and what
it would mean to the national freight rail network?
Mr. Jefferies. Well, the last term you used is key in this,
the national freight rail network. Railroading is the original
federally regulated industry, given its inherent interstate
nature, so things don't happen in a vacuum in one State or the
other. That's why this regulation is clearly illegal under
Federal statute.
But what--one, you're going to--as my colleague said, and
I'm sure he'd be happy to elaborate on, you're going to put
some smaller railroads out of business. You're going to
dramatically increase the cost of transportation by rail, even
for the larger railroads given the, you know, $1.6 billion a
year that they are going to be paying to the State because they
cannot turn their fleet over with a technology that does not
exist.
You know, the--I think about this--who has the most
businesswise reason to profit from this? It's the OEMs, and
it's the OEMs who are making the case that this capability is
not out there. And so you're dramatically increasing the cost
of transportation. What's that going to do? It's going to push
freight onto the highways, increase congestion, increase wear
and tear on publicly owned infrastructure, increase emissions,
and grind to a halt a lot of the free movement of commerce, not
only in California, but in and out the rest of the country.
Some of the workarounds we've discussed even at the highest
level, literally putting traffic onto trucks to move it into
the State because you don't have the locomotive technology,
switching locomotive types if the technology did exist at the
Stateline. That requires a massive amount of buildout of
infrastructure. That's additional handling, switching, reducing
transit--increasing transit times, again, making rail
completely obsolete when it comes to a customer or a shipper's
desire to move goods around the country.
Mr. Fong. So just as a follow up, in your assessment as an
expert in freight railroads, would it be fair to describe the
supply chain impacts as significantly disruptive?
Mr. Jefferies. It would be more than fair to describe it
that way.
Mr. Fong. And let me move to Mr. Baker if you have anything
to add to this conversation on supply chain.
Mr. Baker. I appreciate that. As Ian highlighted, it's a
seamless integrated national rail network, and I represent the
short line railroads, which are typically the first and last
miles. And, as CARB even acknowledges in its own rule tax, this
rule legitimately threatens the viability of short line
railroads. I try not to come up to Congress and Capitol Hill
and speak in hyperbole, but this is an existential threat to
short line railroads. And if small railroads, which just simply
can't afford this mandate on anything remotely resembling the
time that's contemplated, if small railroads go out of
business, then that freight, it just moves to truck. It either
moves out of California, it vanishes, or it moves to trucks.
And so I would say that's devastating for not only the supply
chain, but also the environment, also public safety, also
congestion, and also the taxpayer who has to pay for the
highway maintenance.
Mr. Fong. Moving to Mr. Abbs, as someone who just came from
the State legislature, served on the Select Committee on Ports
and Goods Movement, served during the pandemic and the supply
chain crisis, my question to you is, how does the State of
California plan to mitigate the supply chain disruptions that
are likely to arise because of CARB's regulation?
Mr. Abbs. Thank you, Congressman Fong. Welcome to D.C. It's
good to see you again.
Mr. Fong. It's good to see you. It's like we never left.
Mr. Abbs. So I'm--you know, obviously I'm with the Bay Area
Air Quality Management District. I'm not here to talk about
CARB's overall strategy with respect to supply chain, and so--
and, you know, what they foresee the impacts might be as part
of this--as part of their locomotive regulations----
Mr. Fong. If I could specify then, you oversee the Port of
Oakland. How would you as the--your air quality operations, how
would you--how would it affect the ports there?
Mr. Abbs. Well, so as I mentioned before, we do significant
work in and around the port of West Oakland to try to make that
port area cleaner for the residents of West Oakland. There's
about 26,000 residents in and around the port, and they've been
asking for a cleaner environment for decades. And so the work
at the port and work at the rail operations related to the port
is significant to us. You know, we would love it if we could
get to tier 4 switchers immediately. We would love it if we
could get to zero-emission equipment as fast as possible. But
in terms--and so we'd be definitely hopeful that we can do
that. As I mentioned, incentives coming from the Bay Area are
not enough, and so we rely on them to meet the requirements of
the locomotive regulation to do that.
Mr. Fong. I've run out of time. I think the concern about
cost is what I was trying to get at in terms of how we mitigate
these supply chain disruptions. So thank you.
Chairman Obernolte. The gentleman yields back.
We'll go next to the Ranking Member of the Full Committee.
Ranking Member Lofgren, you're recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. Lofgren. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you
to all the witnesses.
Mr. Abbs, first, I want to thank you for the work that you
are doing in the Bay Area making the air in my district more
breathable and, by extension, improving the health of my own
constituents.
Now, in your testimony, you note that locomotives account
for nearly 1/3 of the pollution reduction needed to bring
highly polluted air basins into attainment of the Clean Air Act
requirements. Now, the other witnesses today have come citing
much smaller numbers, contextualizing locomotive emissions as a
portion of total U.S. emissions or sector-wide emissions. Can
you please explain this discrepancy? Just pointing to say that
.6 percent of total U.S. GHG emissions missed the point when it
comes to protecting the public health of frontline communities.
Mr. Abbs. Thank you, Congresswoman. I think the context
that's missing from some of those statements is that it focuses
specifically on greenhouse gases. This is--the CARB regulation
is air toxic control measure, and so it's designed to get
reductions in diesel particulate matter, which is a carcinogen,
and also to get reductions in NOx, which is an ozone
precursor.
So the overall impact of locomotives nationwide may be 2
percent in terms of GHGs, but really, when you look at it, the
purpose of the California regulation is to get public health
benefits and to get public health benefits through reductions
of diesel particulate, and NOx. There is--as the
regulation does point out, there are reductions in GHGs that
are anticipated, but primarily, those health benefits are from
the air toxics.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you. That's very helpful in
understanding this.
Now, in your testimony, you cited the CARB figures
estimating premature death, emergency room visits, cancer
rates, and those are striking numbers. Can you share what these
drastically improved health metrics would mean for residents of
the Bay Area where Mr. Mullin and I represent?
Mr. Abbs. So when you look at health risks in different air
basins as part of that locomotive regulation, about 1/2 of
those costs, those health benefits come from residents in and
around the South Coast locomotive operations. About a 1/4 of
the remaining benefits accrue to the Bay Area, and then the San
Joaquin Valley also gets a significant amount of benefits. But
between the South Coast, the San Joaquin Valley, and the Bay
Area, we get most of the--about 100 percent of the benefits,
and we have about 100 percent almost of disadvantaged
communities between those three air basins.
Ms. Lofgren. You know, we recently had a briefing on the
hydrogen hubs in California and the very aggressive plans for
the trucking industry in particular to rapidly move that
industry into zero emissions. I think that's important when it
comes to not only the Bay Area, but the whole State, which
leads me--you may not know the answer to this question because
you're Bay Area-focused in your job, but the children of the
Central Valley in California have the highest asthma rate in
the United States, and it's from pollution. And I'm wondering
if you can identify how much of that would be ameliorated
through the rail rule? How much would be ameliorated through
the transition to hydrogen hubs and trucking? Because I-5 is a
major issue in terms of emission. Do you have that information,
or do I need to ask someone else?
Mr. Abbs. I don't have that exact information, but I can
give you something that may satisfy you at least for this
hearing, and then I'll work on getting you some more
information later. CARB did a--what they called a truck-versus-
train analysis where they looked at the pollution disbenefits
of transporting a similar amount of goods by train and by
truck. And what they've discovered is that in the 2020 to 2024
time period, with the advances that we've made in clean
technology for the heavy-duty trucking fleet, a fleet of trucks
transporting the same amount as a train has about the same
amount of pollution, and so the cleanliness of our trucks have
gotten to the point where they're almost cleaner than the same
amount of transport by locomotive. And so what we're hoping to
do as part of this regulation is truly get those locomotives to
be as clean as they claim they are.
Ms. Lofgren. Thank you very much. My time has expired, but
any information you can provide on the questions after this
hearing would be greatly appreciated.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Obernolte. The gentlewoman yields back.
We will go next to the gentleman from Texas. Mr. Babin,
you're recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Babin. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And thank you
to the witnesses for being here and your testimony. I also
serve on Transportation and Infrastructure, and this very
morning we were talking about the emissions--the new emissions
rule coming down in California.
Mr. Baker, in your testimony, you mentioned that the
California Air Resources Board acknowledged that their rule
would potentially bankrupt the short line industry and stated
that it is possible that some of these businesses would be
eliminated if they fail to comply with the rule. CARB sees the
elimination of a critical player in the supply chain as a cost
of doing business. Can you speak to the unique nature of short
line business practices and why meeting CARB's mandate by 2035
is not feasible because of its potential crippling effects?
Mr. Baker. Yes, sir. I appreciate the question. The unique
nature of short lines, which I know you're very familiar with
from your time on the T&I Committee, the origin story of short
lines really is we're keeping lines viable that are really on
the margins, right? We got them from class 1 railroads in the
first place because they didn't make any money, and we've done
everything we can to run as lean, as efficiently as possible,
try to get one more customer, try to do everything we can for
existing customers, and it's widely considered a pretty good
American success story that most agencies we've encountered
would like to double down on and improve.
But CARB's rule contemplates at such a dramatic exponential
increase in how much we would have to pay for locomotives and
mode of power that it would put us out of business. And that's
so obvious that they had to acknowledge it themselves in the
rule. And then, you know, from our point of view, the
consequences of that are relatively obvious, but if we're out
of business, that truck--that freight can't move by rail
anymore, and that destroys the seamless integrated rail
network. That's bad for the economy. That's bad for the
environment. It's bad for public safety.
Mr. Babin. Thank you very much.
Mr. Jefferies and Mr. Baker, you all touched on this in
your testimony, but if this misguided policy goes into effect,
what will the impact of this rule be on constituents outside of
the State of California and on supply chains across the
country?
Mr. Jefferies. Maybe I'll take a first crack, and Chuck can
cleanup my mess. So, you know, there's no such thing as a one-
State regulation when it comes to the interstate rail network.
That's why there's such strong Federal preemption in law
because, as I mentioned in my opening statement, nearly 70
percent of our locomotive fleet moves in and out of the State
of California in any given year. And so what does that do? One,
at the very base case scenario, this rule dramatically
increases the cost of providing rail transportation and most
likely shifts a lot of freight onto the highways. And so what
does that do? It makes our customers pay more. It makes
consumers pay more. It adds stress to the public infrastructure
by pushing more trucks, more traffic onto the highways,
increasing congestion, impacting the daily consumer.
Mr. Obernolte and I just talked about the desire to get
trucks off the highway and onto the rail. If you want to reduce
emissions right now, let's get trucks off the highway onto the
rail, three to four times more efficient when it comes to that.
And so, you know, you can't understate the impacts across the
board.
Mr. Babin. Right. Thank you.
Mr. Baker?
Mr. Baker. He said that very well. I would note that
there's a long history, for better or for worse, of other
States copying CARB's rule, so if this rule goes into effect,
if EPA approves it, I think we could expect some number of
other States, you know, maybe around 10 or 15 as a reasonable
estimate, who would copy this rule and make it even more
national. But I would say California is so big, and nobody
would dispute that. California is so big. A California rule is
essentially a de facto national rule as it affects the
interstate rail network. So all the problems we've talked about
that would come in California would be--you'd see nationwide
very quickly.
Mr. Babin. Thank you very much. Less than a half a minute.
Mr. Baker, it seems like the California Air Resources Board is
choosing winners and losers here. If they are able to move
ahead with this rule, short line railroads look to be slated
for the losers list. Can you talk about just for a second why
short lines in particular are not going to be able to comply
with CARB's compliance deadline and what it means for short
lines around the country?
Mr. Baker. I appreciate that question. Going back again to
the origin story of short lines and how we have to really make
a small business try to run as efficiently as possible, a
typical short line is buying a used locomotive, maybe about
$100,000. They tend to make them last 40, 50, 60 years. The
idea of a rule that would say no locomotive older than 23 years
old can run in California is--if it weren't so serious, I would
almost say it's laughable. But, I mean, I say that to short
line railroads, and they look at me with disbelief like, well,
all of our railroads or all of our locomotives are older than--
--
Mr. Babin. Amen.
Mr. Baker [continuing]. 23 years old.
Mr. Babin. OK. Thank you. And my time's up. Thank you.
Chairman Obernolte. The gentleman yields back.
We'll go next to my colleague from California. Congressman
Mullin, you're recognized for 5 minutes. And nice job on the
baseball field last night.
Mr. Mullin. I'm not going to be commenting on that at this
time. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you all for coming today. I appreciate your
testimony, in particular, Mr. Abbs, for coming to share how
your office improves the lives of Bay Area residents, including
those in my district in the San Mateo and San Francisco
counties.
And, first, I want to start by saying I've long been a
proponent of reducing emissions on railroads. I was one of the
many leaders involved in the nearly finished effort to
electrify the Caltrain corridor, which runs through my
district. This has taken dozens of diesel-powered locomotives
off the rails, reducing emissions for residents, and providing
faster and more frequent service. And while Caltrain is a
localized issue on a commuter rail service, railroads across
the State continue to contribute to greenhouse gas emissions
that should be phased out as quickly as practicable.
I am sympathetic to the industry's concerns over cost and
timeline, yet CARB's rule provides flexibility to ensure the
industry remains viable and the transition is realistic. And
without such regulations, communities like mine and many others
are the ones who pay the costs in dirty air and in the impacts
of climate change such as sea level rise. And, as my colleagues
said earlier, these costs are dramatically higher than the
upfront investment that industry will make to adopt clean rail
technology.
So my question, Mr. Abbs, in your firsthand experience,
what are the costs that Bay Area communities are paying when it
comes to living with air pollution and the consequences of
climate change, including sea level rise? In other words,
what's the cost of doing nothing compared to the cost of
transitioning to cleaner locomotives?
Mr. Abbs. Thank you for that question, Congressman Mullin.
So just before I answer that, I'll just also note that the
Caltrain electrification project, hopefully starting up in
September of this year, replacing 75 percent of the trains,
will yield the GHG benefit, but that's because they're going to
zero-emission trains, so 176,000 tons per year of GHGs, 2
million tons by 2040.
Your question on the risks of--or the costs of doing
nothing, the last 10 years in California, we have rarely gone a
month during the summertime when we haven't had extreme
wildfire smoke from wildfires, orange skies. California
delegation members realize that, in recent years, other parts
of the United States have woken up to problems that we've been
dealing with in California for decades now. Sea level rise,
obviously, it's a big deal in the Bay Area because we're pretty
close to the sea, and, you know, we have airport.
We have San Francisco, which is looking at potentially
billions of dollars to stabilize themselves from sea level
rise. We have Highway 37 that we need to figure out a way to
keep that high enough to withstand high tides. And so the cost
of doing nothing in the Bay Area is substantial, and so that's
why going to zero emission as part of that locomotive
regulation is going to have some serious long-term benefits for
the Bay Area.
Mr. Mullin. Thank you for that. And, as you mentioned in
your testimony, the air district was the first regional air
pollution control agency in the Nation. It predates the Clean
Air Act. And given that, there's a decades-long history of
navigating the puzzle of local, State, and Federal air
pollution regulations is for the benefit of anyone breathing
California air. So can you please describe the air district's
role and its limitations when it comes to addressing air
pollution in the Bay Area? And how does its authority differ
from CARB's?
Mr. Abbs. Thank you for that question. So the Bay Area Air
District, is primarily, we deal with the stationary source
regulation, but at the same time, every air district in
California has to meet certain Clean Air Act standards, the
attainment standards for ozone, different forms of particulate
and other criteria pollutants. And so while air districts can
regulate stationary sources, a lot of the pollution that we see
that affects those Clean Air Act standards come from sources
which the air district really has no authority over.
And so what you've--what you may have seen over the last
several years is air districts like the San Joaquin Valley Air
District, the South Coast Air District, the Bay Area Air
District have been very strong advocates for actions at the
State level and at the Federal level to reduce mobile source
pollution because, without those reductions, most of California
cannot meet Clean Air Act attainment standards. There's 36
counties in California right now that are in non-attainment of
the Federal ozone standards.
Mr. Mullin. Thank you for that, and I'll just conclude by
mentioning that it's my understanding that the EPA made it
clear in November 2023 that CARB indeed has the authority to
regulate locomotives. And with that, I'll yield back, Mr.
Chair.
Chairman Obernolte. The gentleman yields back.
We'll go next to the gentleman from Georgia. Mr. McCormick,
you're recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. McCormick. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Abbs, you just brought up an interesting point about
the ocean rising. How much has it risen in the last 50 years?
Mr. Abbs. I'll have to get back with you on that,
Congressman.
Mr. McCormick. Not a significant amount, obviously, 50
years. Since 1970 what's the carbon emissions--the carbon
content of the atmosphere? Is that greater or less than what it
was in 1970?
Mr. Abbs. Could you repeat that question again?
Mr. McCormick. Carbon content, carbon dioxide levels in the
United--in the entire Earth atmosphere? Was it greater or less
than it was in 1970?
Mr. Abbs. I would say greater.
Mr. McCormick. You care to state that--bet money on that?
Mr. Abbs. I'll let you answer the question either that I'm
right or wrong.
Mr. McCormick. OK. And what percent is atmosphere--is made
up of carbon dioxide, percentage of the atmosphere?
Mr. Abbs. It's a little over 400 parts per billion.
Mr. McCormick. So .04 percent, right? Of that, how much
comes from human beings? About 11 percent. About how much comes
from the United States? 14 percent. Of that, how much comes
from trains in the United States? Point 5 percent. So we're
talking about eliminating .00003 percent of the Earth's
atmosphere, carbon dioxide. That's what we're talking about. Is
that a negligible effect when it's compared to nitrogen at 71
percent? Yes, thank you.
So I love science. I love science. Let's talk about
science, no, not as a religion, but as science because that's
what this is about. And how much heat is produced when we have
to produce massive amounts of electricity? That's what this is
about. Do we want to hamstring ourselves by spending trillions
of dollars based on some California code of a religion of
carbon dioxide?
Georgia's ports, along with the intertwined railroads and
highways--and I'd say Georgia is famous for its railways for a
long time now--are the epicenter of both Georgia and the
Southwest U.S. economy. Ironically, Georgia typically benefits
from California's outrageous regulations because we get a lot
of business that moves to our State because of it. However,
California's Air Resource Board's--CARB--latest rule to make
freight rail zero emissions jeopardizes the interconnected
freight rail network. Meanwhile, the EPA's own study stated
that freight railroads contribute to-what did I say--.5
percent, .5 percent of the total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.
I already talked about the negligible effect we began with. If
you--matter of fact, if you eliminate all the cars' emissions
in the United States, .000167 percent in case you're wondering
is how much of the atmosphere we're talking about. Negligible,
guys, that's science.
If California received this waiver from the EPA for the
proposed rule, it would allow California to dictate the
emissions policy for the entire country at devastating economic
impact. What can we spend that money on? If you want to have a
scientific discussion about how we save the Earth, don't start
with that because, by the way, based on a Senate scientific
study, Pluto, Mars, Jupiter are all heating, too. Is it because
of their carbon emissions? Of course not. Let's have a real
scientific discussion about climate change. This is what's
driving me crazy, guys, when we have these conversation.
Mr. Jefferies, can you further explain how California's
decision would impact railroads, supply chain, and military
bases in Georgia?
Mr. Jefferies. Well, because we operate a nationwide
interconnected network, whatever happens in California,
whatever regulations in California are effectively national
regulations because 70 percent of our locomotives move in and
out of the State of California.
And I should just point out that maybe most folks on this
Committee may not be aware, but we are self-funded. We fund all
of our own infrastructure, all of our own investments to the
tune of about $21 billion a year. This is not coming from the
Federal Government. These are businesses decisions that we are
making, and so it----
Mr. McCormick. Unfunded mandates, right?
Mr. Jefferies. Absolutely.
Mr. McCormick. Love it when the government does that.
Mr. Baker, in your testimony, you mentioned that the
California Air Resource Board acknowledged that their rule
would potentially bankrupt the short line industry and stated
that it is possible some of these businesses would be
eliminated if they fail to comply. California sees the
elimination of a critical player in the supply chain as a cost
of doing business. It's crazy.
The Georgia Northeast Railroad is a class 3 short line that
runs through my district. Can you speak to the unique nature of
the short line business practices and why meeting California's
mandate by 2035 is not feasible?
Mr. Baker. Yes, sir. The Georgia Northeastern Railroad is a
great example of a typical short line, but they're maintaining
lines in small towns and rural America that are marginal,
frankly, that otherwise are at risk of not existing. And to do
that, they have to run efficiently, smart, and clean, and so
they do everything they can to get cleaner, including upgraded
cleaner locomotives when they can, but they just can't afford
this mandate. It would force many of them out of business in
California and if it went national in Georgia, too.
Mr. McCormick. So with that, I'm going to rest my case that
this is not based on science. This is based on California's
religion that doesn't have any effect on the outcome of the
atmosphere, that there is global climate change, but it's not
due to trains. We don't need to spend--we don't need put
businesses out of order and change everything based on
California's idea that they're going to fix the world with
electronic trains. I'm sorry. With that, I yield.
Chairman Obernolte. The gentleman yields back.
We'll go next to the gentlewoman from New York.
Congresswoman Tenney, you're recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. Tenney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Ranking
Member, and thank you to our witnesses today.
I just want to first go to Dr. Dick and ask you, you were
earlier asked about funding for your research. It was alluded
to or suggested that your research is tainted. My understanding
that your research has also been funded by the Federal
Government. Is that correct?
Dr. Dick. Yes, that is correct. Just to go back and looking
back over my funding history, roughly maybe 5 percent of my
total funding was received from the Association of American
Railroads. The majority of my funding related to alternative
energy locomotives was received from CARB itself, the Federal
Railroad Administration (FRA), and also the Department of
Energy's Advanced Research Projects Agency--Energy, ARPA-E, on
several--I do projects on that front. The vast majority of my
funding on the alternative energy locomotive stuff has come
from DOE and FRA and not from the Association of American
Railroads.
Ms. Tenney. Those sound pretty independent to me. Thank you
for that. Thank you for clarifying that because it does--your
record does show that you actually do indeed get funding, as
you just stated, from the California Air Resources Board
itself, so--this is the rule that we're contesting here.
And I just want to say--just ask you again--are you--can I
just get a little bit about your background? So my question to
you, Dr. Dick, is it says you've been studying civil
engineering and railways since 1999. Is that correct?
Dr. Dick. That's correct.
Ms. Tenney. OK. How about Mr. Jefferies? You've been
involved in rail issues since 2009 and served in the Inspector
General's office at the Department of Transportation. Is that
correct?
Mr. Jefferies. That's correct.
Ms. Tenney. Mr. Baker, you have been involved in rail
issues since 2004. Is that correct?
Mr. Baker. That's right, 20 years.
Ms. Tenney. OK. Mr. Abbs, I couldn't find anything in our
research on--in your bio on railroads or rail systems. Have you
ever worked on a railroad or for the rail industry?
Mr. Abbs. No, I have not.
Ms. Tenney. OK. Did you study railroads or any of these
issues with peer-reviewed studies like the--Dr. Dick and some
of the other men sitting here?
Mr. Abbs. No, I haven't.
Ms. Tenney. OK. So this hearing is about the proposed
California Air Resources Board--I'll call it CARB. I don't like
to talk about carbs, I don't know--and what this regulation
will have on the national rail network, not on environment and
pollution control. It seems to me that you're more of an
environmentalist and not so much an expert on railways and
makes you kind of like an odd witness for this because your
expertise is not on how to conduct railroads more successfully.
Is there anything that--in this regulation that you have done
or anything that deals with railways, not environment, in terms
of what this regulation would be about?
Mr. Abbs. Again, I have no experience with railways.
Ms. Tenney. So I know you were--this question has probably
come up, and I--we've been in and out of here, but I want to
just say, do you know what percentage of U.S. freight is
transported on railways?
Mr. Abbs. No, I do not.
Ms. Tenney. OK. It's 40 percent. I think somebody talked
about that earlier. So this is an easy one for you, Mr. Abbs,
because I know Mr. McCormick--or Dr. McCormick just explained
this to you. But what percent of the U.S. greenhouse gases are
caused by railroads?
Mr. Abbs. I believe the number was 2 percent.
Ms. Tenney. Point 5 percent, I think, was the correct
answer. Would you agree with that?
Mr. Abbs. I'll take your word for it.
Ms. Tenney. Thank you. OK. What percent of U.S.
transportation greenhouse gases are caused by railroads? I
think we--Mr.--Dr. McCormick went over this. He's a Marine,
too, so he's a Marine and Dr. McCormick. He's got a lot of
titles--and scientist. The answer is 1.7 percent. I think--I
believe that was asked. So if 40 percent of freight is
transported by railways, and yet they only account for 1.7
percent of transportation-related greenhouse gases. Why would
CARB target railways instead of, say, the trucking industry?
Mr. Abbs. Yes, thank you for that question. So CARB has
done extensive regulations with the trucking--on the trucking
industry with respect to California and, as I mentioned earlier
in questions, has done a truck-versus-train analysis on a
load--equivalent load on a train versus a truck and found that
in the 2020 to 2024 time period, the particulate matter and
NOx emissions from a----
Ms. Tenney. Let me take--reclaim my time and just--because
I'm running out of time, but I know that there's this vision
and a need to magically transform us into complete electric. I
come from the State of New York, very similar to a regulatory
regime that we have in California, and I worry about what could
happen in a State like New York with--you know, we can get
five, six feet of snow in just a 24-hour period from the lake
effect snow from either Lake Erie or Lake Ontario. It would be
catastrophic, it would be dangerous, and people would die,
including schoolchildren are now being forced to be on electric
buses in the State of New York with policies that are just only
focused on electricity and only on electrification and not on
safety, science, and those things. And that's what worries me
is that we're trying to--we have to look at the realities of
what we're dealing with with people and children and our
communities that we serve.
And that's why I feel like someone with an expertise in
railways, transportation, and all these things, maybe with your
background mixed in with that would be more suitable, but you
don't seem to have that background as far as dealing with the
practical aspects of railways.
So with that, my time is expired. Really, thank you so
much, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to the witnesses.
Chairman Obernolte. The gentlewoman yields back.
That concludes our question-and-answer period. I want to
thank all of the witnesses for your valuable testimony and all
of the Members for the questions. The record will remain open
for 10 days for additional comments and written questions from
Members.
This hearing is now adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:24 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
Appendix I
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Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Mr. Ian Jefferies
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Responses by Mr. Chuck Baker
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Responses by Mr. Alan Abbs
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Responses by Dr. Tyler Dick
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Appendix II
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Additional Material for the Record
Letters submitted by Representative Jay Obernolte
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[all]